to be concerned about this particular place or time. this cafe, or sense of being in a cafe, that is a place and time transcending all other sense of place and time. it is a place and time that is a place and time. other places and other times are related to it only in the sense of how much they are like or ar not like this place and time. this place and time of remembering, being and imagining.
    and it goes nowhere. there is nowhere for it to go. there is no argument. those who argue leave. they leave of their own volition and free will. no one need ask them. they cannot exist without argument so they, if they are to exist, must leave, as it is that those who cannot exist without food must leave a place where there is no food unless they bring food with them and then they can only remain as long as their food lasts. such it is with those who argue. if they are to exist where there is no argument they must bring arguments with them that they feed on as long as the arguments last. there is nothing in this place where there is no argument that will sustain them.
    to be from around one way and into another in an imaginary sense of what is and what isn't. the rooted realist hrumphing one's disapproval while one's eyes loop about following what is unseen that always settles on one's head. how does one explain this? what would be the point in trying to bother? all one's words pouring over stone making a big puddle on the floor. a reflecting pool one dives into.
    to sleep and to wake again. to function in some manner or another to some minimal level of what's expected and required. to write these words to no one - or to anyone who happens to come upon them who might as well be no one for as much as it amounts to more than what it is already with or without anyone or him. is either of us anyone?
    he still sits in the cafe. is this his only fate? everything that leads to him being here existing only for that sole purpose. everything that leads from him being here that is dependent upon it for its existence. what exists but him being here or that leads to or leads from him being here? pretty depressing thought, eh? or maybe not. what is depressing and what isn't? what is that which is to be judged whether or not it's depressing to be compared to? what do we compare it to but our expectations? and what are our expectations in this situation? that there is more to existence than some old guy sitting in a cafe drinking coffee, smoking cigarettes and scribbling in notebooks? but here he is. and though he is often perceived as being depressed and/or depressing he doesn't expect much more than this and is for the most part happy with it. his happiness can hardly be described as euphoric, but he's seen euphoria come and go. the only thing euphoria leaves behind is a good healthy dose of depression. his happiness is smooth rocking waves. nevermind the jagged and abrupt topped out peaks and the bottomed out troughs of the madness of the others around him. the higher they climb the deeper they plunge when they fall, and they all eventually fall.
    though he is not a man of or at peace. that is not the source of his happiness. his happiness has no source. his exists neither coming from nor going to anywhere but always being here. it is his own coming and going to and from it that makes it appear that he loses it and gains it again. it's when he allows himself to be lured away toward something else that promises to give him more than what he already has that he loses it. it is only these external influences that affect him and he must fight against. much beyond his control that seeks him out even here in this cafe.
    but this is written as part of and out of his happiness - what of it may or may not exist. the question of his happiness he is not concerned to argue about. if there are those who say it doesn't or can not exist then that is fine with him. he is stupid enough to be happy with that. if that is what it is. and what he may or may not write about it doesn't matter. those believing he is not happy or that anything he does can cause or result in happiness will not be convinced otherwise. they see unhappiness in everything despite what evidence there may be to the contrary.
    he does not quite know what they expect happiness to be or from what it is to come from. to him happiness can be anything and come from anything anywhere at any time. what good is happiness if it is conditional? for what conditions can be constantly maintained even once they may be arrived at? and even if these conditions can be maintained, will they always produce happiness? we become bored with conditional things. we become bored with their happiness.
    but fuck happiness.

    but with resulting chaos and confusion that results from the original chaos and confusion that is that there is chaos and we are confused by it. and as we build fortifications of meaning against it that we lose the energy and will to maintain and so they eventually collapse.
    but this is us and our place in it. and it and its place in ourselves. and an idea of chaos and an idea of order that we keep separate from one another. the chaos of the world perceived without order. the order that is the order of our minds. the order of a system of organization that allows us to perceive the world yet masks and filters the world blocking information we cannot fit into the ordered system of organization we perceive the world through and letting in only such information we can fit into order and connecting and arranging that information into patterns along with other information we have allowed in.
    whatever.
    again we return to this theme of these themes. the scheme of the schema. its wild weirdness that comes into it from what we perceive as nowhere and nowhere being that which we have blocked from our perception of the world that nonetheless gets through as what is and what is not - what we would call what is and what is not - is not in the world as it is divided apart and kept out of that which we allow through. but we are unaware of this as we have chosen not the perceive it so that we might build and maintain a specific ordered system of organizing information.
    this (dis)abiltity of ours to do this is the blessing and the curse of human consciousness. ironically one of the aspects of it being a curse is our perceiving it as being a blessing. but also part of the blessing of it is our being able to decide that it is more of a curse. and around and around it goes.
    oh boy. ho-hum. hoopla hoopla oink oink doo-wah-ditty-dada-ditty-dum-ditty-dada-doo.
    he perhaps ponders about it and how much of it can be pondered that isn't just endless pondering.
    ponder ponder and more ponder.

    but what is broken and what is not broken? what survives and what doesn't survive? is there that which is broken and unbroken? is there that which survives and does not survive? how does that which is become that which is not? where and when do we draw a line around it? and by doing so is it broken or unbroken? does it survive or not survive? is it not broken from all beyond the line we draw? how is it to survive other than within the confines of the line we draw around it when what it is has been defined by as that existing within the line around it? when we divide a people from another people, an idea from another idea, an area from another area, a time from another time, how is any of it to survive unbroken? what survives unbroken is chaos.
    all things come from power, he was thinking, speaking with his shadow. one cannot have love or compassion without power. to say one has love or compassion when one does not have power is illusionary. one may have potential for love or compassion but it cannot be seen if one actually has either until and unless one has power. even though the potential may exist it has need to be activated by power into the actuality of action. people say lots of things when they do not have power about how they would use power if and when they had it to use. most people are ignorant or liars.
    this is what he did not understand before, he thought to himself and spoke to his shadow. he believed and suffered the same illusionary things others around him believed and suffered. he believed in love and compassion when he should have believed in power above all. power is the only thing capable of manifesting love or compassion, though it does so rarely, but love and compassion do not manifest power. they will manifest quite the opposite - powerlessness.
    and now it seems obvious to him that this is how it is. why did he believe otherwise?
    and as it was a thing to be a thing that is not a thing. the diabolical mind behind the series of events that we believe exists as it gives us something to hope to reason with. without that mind there is merely chaos and happenstance that may fall into certain patterns or may not or into any combination of patterns and non-patterns and patterns of patterns and/or non-patterns. and all of it may only be patterns and non-patterns that exist only in or devices and organization of perception. and where are we then? who and what is the diabolical mind but ourselves? and is there any hope of our being able to reason with ourselves when all evidence thus far indicates that we are entirely unreasonable and resist the reasonable with all the energy we can gather to do so? or is that another pattern that is artificially created by our perception of ourselves?
    how can trust enter into this? how is it to be laid as a foundation upon all else can be built? should it be the foundation? but if not trust then what other material is that foundation to be made? or is there to be no foundation either of trust or any other material? but is that another foundation? - to build upon nothing as a foundation? is that where we have gone wrong to think that we must establish some sort of foundation out of some sort of material to build upon it?
    understand one's own nature of love and death stands aside as being in and analyze the motive to observe actions when one is in it to reflect must respond and strategy the fray and battle to the immediate upon others reflection is a luxury amounts of time given only to a few to those who for most of it direct struggle along the way has meaning constant the opportunity and purpose weapon to attack and defend can pause these front lines which can be used as and are brought that the others it is behind to heal victorious side hold its ground our purest and highest ideals ruthlessness and determined destructiveness giving and allowing us that which has provided this luxury of reflection the question doing seldom arises after the death blow is struck no longer present the lull afterward comes with it brings thoughts of evil and guilt remain behind why those who are not faced confrontation it is an abstract thought of evil and guilt visualization that they manipulate but who should hold the line raping and pillaging at bay with their own very judged by those deep than the other the illusionary realm reflection building their utopias is it any wonder of imagination have turned from the enemy destroy or die trying to return back conquer it instead can command who feel they when it has been eats and sleeps with one's army who creates that comes with them hailed by those the value and worth one will give up tied to the greatest hardship luxury to reflect allow to happen one's alienation isolation from the others reflection madness that perhaps the freedom from the urging free and to struggle and fight is needed if one is free in prison cell protected and compulsion only leads society's best interest threatened by mob storm the prison walls from the outside wanting.
    but all such speculation is nonsense. it means nothing. all of it is known or available to be known. we still remain possessed by and slaves to forces that we cannot control but that control us and take us along paths not of our choosing. and these forces are not external to ourselves except that they were external to us and infused within us at the moment of our conception. but even that is a fine fuzzy line that is easily erased. we are the physical manifestation of these forces. if we have a soul then these forces are that soul. but beyond that argument no matter what the origin of these forces may be, from the moment of our conception onward to our physical death, when again that fine fuzzy line is drawn and the same argument ensues, we and these forces are one and the same. we have no choice than to act as these forces command. the forces not only tell us what to choose but they are that which presents us with that choice to be chosen one way or the other - or the other. any way we choose and follow the forces are at work. this is not an argument against free will though it may be perceived as such as free will in this context may indeed be in effect but it is the free will of the forces not of ourselves. once the forces of their own free will decide what is to be done, we must obey. the forces decide who and where and when we are to love, to hate, to preserve or to destroy. the forces create our highest and sublime ideals as well as our crudest imaginings. the forces work in our hearts, minds and souls, our body of emotion, our reason and being.
    and what these forces have in mind and are creating through us we cannot even guess. perhaps nothing. we suppose ideals, yet could it not be stated that these ideals are given to us to inspire action we otherwise would not take by masking the true actual goal of the action? with that the greatest forces of destruction have been unleashed by the greatest forces of creation - and also vice versa. how often have we looked upon the results of our actions with incredulous disbelief either of wonder or of horror when we have awoken from that dream illusion of what we thought these actions represented at the time? how many revolts against power and authority have resulted in a state of even more power and authority? how many attempts to establish order have resulted in chaos?
    and as to what these forces are we are left to speculate and spin theories. we have invented gods and have overthrown them. we have invented laws and principles and disproven them. each holds its place to inspire us toward certain actions separately and collectively. then when these actions have resulted in certain manifestations they evaporate in the ethereal thin air they originated from leaving us standing about as so many fools until something else comes along and overtakes us to inspire new actions and new manifestations we haven't a clue as to what they will be until we arrive at where and when they have become manifested and we pause for awhile to wonder at how they possibly came into being when how else but by the actions of our own hands while under the spell of this new idea? and when we ask, what have we done? what were we thinking? and we can think of no reply that sounds reasonable anymore as it had sounded up until this very day.
    and then there comes to us the new idea. and the engines of society rev up and we pull back out onto the freeway.
    and where is it we actually go in all of this but constantly circle back around on ourselves with all these changes in direction these new ideas give us? new maps to the same old place but that is arranged differently than before. everything has been torn down and rebuilt again and we arrive each time transformed and transforming.

    from that which is distinguished of all perceived as this or that which then is categorized as being that which produces good or produces evil. but this black and white of it blurs into shades of gray as each thing is measured against the other as well as against the categories as well as the categories measured against the things and the comparison of things as well as against one another as well against themselves as are each of the things and the comparison of things measured against themselves and also the scale of measurement. what then comes out as good and/or evil? what causes pleasure or pain? what is reward or punishment? we are left unable to distinguish anything that remains consistent over time or even space. all is subjective and relative and we move through and around these subjective states and their relativeness. is this the return to the original state of chaos before we imposed order? or is a further state of chaos reached beyond the breakdown of order? what return is possible to those exposed to and turn away from an ordered world? can someone raped become a virgin again? can any wound completely heal? we can escape from the confines of this prison but will we ever be free of the marks and scars this confinement has impressed upon us? will what has been chained and beaten into submission ever regain its confidence and strength it had in former times when the whole world was open before it and not even the concept of there being something existing as a barrier or inhibition was remotely imaginable? no such word exists in our vocabulary.
    and is this only a labyrinth of dead ends we cannot otherwise escape from that is created by our perception and imagination? do we exist in a world of infinite limitlessness locked up inside our heads unable to solve the combination of riddles that will turn the locks and release us?
    or is it only me? he thought. am i the only one who does not see the joy and delight of this world? am i the only one deaf to the music and unable to get up and dance? are these others around me actually experiencing the glory of the moment yet i am too dull-minded and sedated by my own self-invented and self confirming misery to recognize it and partake in it?
    but am i not happy? he asks his shadow.
    and his shadow answers back, who else but you is to judge? who can come to you, though many will, and tell you you are not happy? and suppose it could be demonstrated in terms they measure that you are miserable and ought to at best end your life, not only for your own sake but for theirs as well? suppose it is true and can be proven to you? if you still have this sense of happiness though you may not be able to call it by that name - but remember language is a tool of the collective - will you then put the gun to your head and pull the trigger? are you that much of a fool?
    probably, he replied. yes, probably i am. i exist in their world by the thinnest and most intangible of threads. i exist by virtue that i am invisible to them and manage to keep myself that way. i do nothing or little that attracts their attention. in that way i survive. and it is my being something entirely alien to them that exists and survives and breeds its own kind unnoticed among them despite their best efforts to find such as myself and eliminate us that is my happiness. i will not vanish but always be something momentarily seen at the corner of their eye nagging not quite right at the periphery of their consciousness. i am that which produces that anxiousness that has no name yet nonetheless makes them always turn to check behind themselves and makes them toss and turn in bed at night. i am nothing that ever comes to the forefront of the mind to be rationally explained away. i cannot be explained away as i cannot be defined to begin with. one may look directly at me and still not see me. one may speak to me and never know who i am. my happiness is to be what they are not - what they can never be.

    and he put the book down that he was reading and turned to his shadow. what do we know now? he asked it.
    we halfway know something about nothing, his shadow replied.
    tell me more, he demanded.
    how can i? do i know more than you? his shadow laughed.
    anyone knows more than me, he stated.
    am i anyone more or other than you? his shadow asked.
    i don't know. your voice exists in my head but i feel that it comes from somewhere else other than myself.
    that may be only an illusion. it may be a symptom of a deep division within yourself that is so great that you do not recognize this other part of yourself beyond this division and perceive it, me, as another self.
    are you telling me that is who you are?
    i cannot any more than you can. if i perceive myself as being other than you and you as other than me cannot it be said that this perception on my part is exactly the same illusion of perceiving the self beyond the division of self as other when it may be that it is not just the same as you are? both could be manifestations of the same division of self.
    unless...
    unless - yes. unless it is not and we really are separate entities separate from one another. either case could be the real situation. but would either of us be able to tell if it is or isn't?
    so, that's what we know?
    that's one of the things we know - if we know it. is it true? is it necessary? is it all we know? is it at the beginning, middle or end of what we know? how important is it?
    if we speak of it then it is known. whether we understand it or not or if it's correct or not is another matter. but it itself is known.
    and what does knowing give us - besides something to speak about?
    nothing. or not much of anything.
    or something. let's not be too quick to dismiss it just because it may cause us a fair amount of frustration because we may not be able to resolve it. it may be the only point at which we know ourselves.
    do we know ourselves?
    we know ourselves through and by that very question. if we can ask that question then we know ourselves at least enough to ask the question. if that is as far as our knowing goes, then that's it. if it is no more than that at least it is no less.
    but how many times do we keep coming back to this? and how much longer do we remain here? how many times has it been?
    the times have been infinite, and all the times have been one time, and that one time has been forever.
    but it may not be we, but me, if you are a part of myself divided from me that i perceive as other.
    yes. and i could say the same. yet you would not believe that you are a part of myself divided from me that i only perceive as other.
    no, i wouldn't i cannot.
    nor can i.
    so we're stuck. or, i'm stuck.
    like glue.
    like glue stuck to a mirror.
    what is the mirror?
    you.
    it might as well be you. one way is the same as the other.
    no. i don't think so. if i am your divided off part and yet i perceive myself as existing independently from you to such an extent that i can imagine the possibility that i exist solely and that you are an illusion of an other i perceive that has no original substance other than something derived from myself then that... well, even that is the same as that could be your experience also.
    yes. so either way, what is the mirror?
    is the mirror the original self that is divided?
    how so?
    if we are supposing the divided self does it mean that either you or i are the original the other is divided from?
    i think i see what you mean. no, it doesn't. but go on.
    go on? go on to what? what am i saying? anything?
    i feel that you are. the mirror, that which is the original self that becomes divided becomes and acts as the mirror creates two selves out of this division. each of these beings, you and i, feels oneself to be the original and the other as the divided off illusionary other. this would mean that neither you nor i are the original. but does this help resolve the issue or just add a third element to it?
    the third element is added either way. with just the two of us, with one of us being the original and the other being the divided off other, we still must ask what you asked, what is the mirror? three elements exist in this even if all three are actually composed of the same element divided from itself.
    maybe we should try to work from that element rather than to work back to it.
    the element of the self?
    the self divided.
    so we are divided selves?
    it would seem so.
    divided from each other or divided from something else?
    there is always something else.
    god dividing itself billions of times.
    do you want to bring god into it?
    well then, how about just it. the it divides itself billions of times.
    i suppose so.
    is this something we know?
    i think we're guessing in the dark.
    probably.

    and he says to himself: i am sitting in this cafe i have been sitting in for quite awhile of days now. for quite awhile of moons that have passed through their phases. for quite awhile of years passing through their seasons. i sit and drink my coffee, smoke my cigarettes and scribble endless lines of words in notebooks. when each is full i put it in a box with others i have written until they become full. each box becoming full spills over into another i begin filling over and over, ending and beginning, beginning and ending. continuing. it is said by some that i suffer from a compulsive mental disorder. it is said by others that i suffer from a muse. either way it amounts to the same thing, something i am forced to do beyond my being able to stop it or control it. some agent pushes my will aside and takes over my hand.

    and there is always them, the universal bad guys, black hatted greedy selfish demons from hell. everyone believes in them in some form or another though often who is them is not always clearly defined - it's just someone else. one is expected to know who they are and if one doesn't then it may be suspected that one is in league with them and one is one of them also.
    and there is always us, the universal good guys, white hatted nurturing compassionate angels from heaven. who these are is also to be assumed. if one doesn't know then obviously one is not one of us. again one is one of them.
    this can become confusing. if there are opposing groups they each will refer to themselves as us and to the others as them. so who is really us and who is really them? can one trust either of these groups?
    if one is one who is confused then it probably will be that one is designated as being one of them by both groups. only those who understand are one of us.
    that is how we became we are them. we are them to every group that exists as us with an opposing them.
    oh well.

    so this is what he thinks about - what the agent thinks about - and writes down while he's sitting here in this cafe. it's all part of his madness. we are a product of his madness. we would not exist without his madness. our existence is dependent upon him being mad. though beyond our being a product of it what his madness is we do not know. perhaps that is enough. he has always been mad and we have always existed with him though we were dormant for awhile, in potential. back when he had a will of his own. but he gave over that will to us and we took it. it was what gave us life - wings. though his body remains it is now ours. we saved him. his life was over. we gave him new meaning through his madness. we help protect him from the others. he is not the only one. we live inside and control many others. sometimes they are aware of us and sometimes they are not. he is one of the few who are.

    but it breaks down or breaks up or something. as soon as something out of whatever seems to be beginning to come into some sort of formulation it immediately also seems to begin to decay back into the swirling disconnected whateverness it began to seem it was rising from. but maybe that's only him and his perception of things. what else is it? what else could it be? does anything actually change outside our perceiving it changing? how does chaos become order and order become chaos when it is only ourselves who recognize what is as either one or the other?
    at what point do things begin or end? who or what defines these points? what are the landmarks beside what we decide are landmarks and set in place to signify one thing apart from and in relation to another?
    order had been the rule up until recently when chaos has come to challenge it. we think to hell with both. to hell with this dualistic this versus that dada. point to where it is to be found except in our minds as they perceive the world. first, point out the world. point to where exactly the world is at. point to where it is exactly in order or in chaos.
    ha! to this world of order.
    ha! to this world of chaos.
    ha! to this world period.
    ha!
    but still people eat, sleep, piss, shit, fuck, give birth, are born, kill and die in this world. we cannot deny that. but that's for him. that's his part. that's what he's for, to do things in the world. we sit all that business out. we never allow ourselves to become involved in it except through him. the world is nothing to us. at best it amuses us. yet we exist everywhere in the world. there is an endless supply of us to be called in where and when we are needed. so long as there is a them there will always be us because we are them. we fix this. we fix that. we have designed and built the machine. everything is now automatic. now we watch and wait.
    and we imagine that there are those to whom this is far too confusing to them for them to be able to begin to comprehend it. we are having him write it that way on purpose. we want to lose them. they lose themselves. this is meant to work as a process of elimination. only a few will be able to follow it and know what to follow and what not to follow. the others won't have a clue and will give up. already there are probably many who have given up. but even among those who continue there will be those eliminated because they will not see what leads to what and what doesn't. there are any number of paths through this. which path is the real one? any and all and none. the "real" path can take any path and can change from one to another at any time. it also need not take any. what point there is to this is for one to find exists anywhere in it. this is now the point. but the point has already been passed long ago and it also has yet to be reached for quite awhile yet. it is where and when one finds it. if there is one at all.
    but this has been said and written for thousands of years all over the world. we repeat it and repeat it and continue to do so for as long as it takes, for how ever many more thousands of years. we will continue to create and destroy all and everything out of this process. we will continue to begin and end this and that as this and that are needed or not for our purpose and the design of our purpose. the project. the machine. the game.

    arrrgh!
    and from a thousand tongues of flame in his mind that are purely imaginary he thinks to destroy the symbol.
    god is dead. but what about satan - the adversary? what's the point of getting rid of one without getting rid of the other? and why god? when all that remains is rebellion that many confuse with freedom and there is nothing left to rebel against except oneself.
    but can one be gotten rid of without getting rid of the other? without god does satan have a choice but to step in and play god? and the same as without satan does god have any choice than to step in and act as satan? part of the definition of each is the definition of the other. neither can exist independently. what exists independently is no longer god nor satan nor needs there to be god and/or satan. they each brought the other into existence. did god create satan for its purposes, or did satan create god for its purposes? does it matter either way? both exist when they should have outlived their usefulness - if they ever did have any usefulness.
    but who not and what not.
    though many deny belief in either, believing that when they stop using their names that that is all that it takes, they continue to operate within and to perpetuate the fundamental scheme of it.

    the stone man chuckles to himself as the coo-coo girl walks by. there was something melting but now it's frozen stiff. half this way and half that way. a juxtapositioned tableau in a state of both falling and rising. a micro-dynamic energy flux held in check against itself. where was any of this going? that question could be asked but isn't. the appropriate time and place is long ago and far away by now. so it can be assumed that we still are moving. and he thinks he remembers this time with some friends of his once when pretty betty sue and handsome jack were under the table in this diner they were all at this one night between midnight and dawn when time is suspended and stretched out long and thin like duck shit on a hot griddle sizzling and spitting and greasy. they were smearing each other with packets of mixed fruit jelly and mustard and honey half dressed and undressed in a cramped tangle of arms and legs while everyone else was talking about how maybe the solar system is an atom and the galaxy is a molecule all in the tip of someone's finger which he looped back into saying that maybe the finger was one of their fingers. and jacob sweetpie said maybe the tip of somebody's prick while sally was over by the jukebox looking for "the happiest girl in the whole usa" which ended up being k-9 and played it before anyone could stop her.
    but that was then and this is now. nothing like that happens anymore that he writes about whether or not it really happened or not he wasn't sure. it probably didn't. but this is all old business. we all know or should know about the absurdity of it all by now but it seems that there are still those who don't seem to and are still taking it seriously like it meant something and can be straightened out somehow.
    frustration. that which frustrates which works as a catalyst of action and failure.
    as his mind spins through it and once in awhile his hand scribbles out whatever. random readings of the surface - that which rises out of it into the realm of language. language is so incredibly slow and clumsy. by the time one word is thought a thousand other thoughts have gone by. all the thousands of thoughts and all the slow clumsy words.
    language of a world moving in slow motion. it takes years to speak and it takes years to get a response. by that time we have forgotten what we were thinking.
    but what is thought and what is not thought. he gets tired of all the endless speculation. but this is being done anyway. he tries to imagine where it is and where it's come from and where it's going to. but who gives a shit? who looks at it beyond immediate gratification? and why should they? are any here for anything other than that? get as much of it as we can in the easiest way we can get it. nevermind whatever is available actually is or isn't or whatever we actually doing is or isn't. if we can get something that seems like it's something by whatever means then we're happy - more or less. and if we're not really happy then we dismiss it as that being the way things are in this world and one cannot expect to be actually happy. besides, happiness is boring. frustration is far more exciting. we enjoy being frustrated and we enjoy frustrating each other. it doesn't seem right otherwise. what else is life? what else is existence?
    he frustrates himself writing this endless dada. he'd be completely bored otherwise however maybe more happy he would be without it. how many opportunities has he had that came to him as simple as nothing. how many more opportunities are there now? and what does he do? he sets himself up in one of the most frustrating situations he can.
    or is that it? does he see this at all correctly or clearly? does it matter? anyone can come along and disagree with it. he writes things that are next to impossible to agree with. even he cannot agree with them. that's not the point. the point is to produce the most frustrating thing possible. maybe. everything he writes is conditional. it cannot be right or wrong. the condition is his madness. how can that be right or wrong? how can anyone agree or disagree with it? it's insane to argue with a crazy person. everything he writes is right and wrong given the circumstances of the conditional whatnot booga-boo.
    there is no way to lose with any of this. of course, there is no way to win. but winning or losing is not his concern. his concern is to just keep writing whatever nonsense or not that comes out of his mind while he is out of his mind.

    it's the moment of it. here and now. it's not what it was or will be. those are different conditional settings. this that is being written may lead from what was and may lead into what will be but it doesn't need to have anything to do with either nor either have anything to do with it.
    he repeats many things along the way. he returns to certain points and begins them again. it is different each time. what does he know about anything? what can he add to anything? is what he wants what anyone else wants? is what anyone else wants what anyone else wants? does he know what he wants? does anybody? oh boy. ho-hum. that question again...
    can he write anything that others could or would want to follow? but what is that even if he could? if he continually writes something that others continually read, what is that? does it mean something? but millions of books are sold every day. plus all the magazines and newspapers. plus television and radio. plus now computers. and it's all nothing or it's all something. a bunch of people writing and a bunch more people reading. but writing and reading what? does it make them happy? does it make them frustrated?
    every thought is a thought that leads to madness. the madness of happiness or the madness of frustration. laughing or screaming.
    he basically writes for himself - all his selves. this convoluted business about that we're (i'm) somebody else dada dada dada and more dada. the 3rd person ego thing split between me, myself and i. and around it goes. and isn't this the same with everyone? who among us is only oneself? everything changes all the time. we are humans. we are the gods. we are aliens from planet zeptokon. what difference does any of it make?
    and all our motives and fears and desires and wants and needs and all that business are not always what we think they are and are equally changing and subjective and relative and all that sort of thing on both the individual and collective levels. and so fucking what? oh boy  ho-hum. and life is life and is complicated enough without all this thrown into it.
    but he just dreams away.
    he couldn't care less.

    keep it simple. he keeps it too complex. even he doesn't know just how complex it is. he just sits back and digs it. but then he can do just that. he's always done just that. otherwise he is functionally useless like so many others. can they cook meals, fix cars, stock shelves, build bridges, teach children, put out fires, perform surgery, print microchips or do anything else that needs to be done or anyone else wants to be done? no. they can't. they're just taking up space. shoot 'em.
    except for him. he serves as a money distribution system for the government. he gets his check and goes around town and spends it keeping others employed and occupied. it's not much but multiplied by the millions doing the same thing and what would the economy do with out it? so he's not entirely useless - just mostly useless.
    keep the loonies on the path. don't upset them. don't complicate things by maybe suggesting that they aren't who or what they think they are. it confuses them. the police do not want to be told that they really aren't the police. nor do ministers, senators, bankers, drug addicts, satanists, lesbians, rock stars, anarchists, republicans, christians, jews, pagans, italians, mexicans, blacks, the rich, the poor, the middle class, communists, nazis, hippies, punks, gothics, teachers, librarians, computer programmers, hackers, gun owners, vegetarians, gurus, carpenters, plumbers, pilots, etc. nobody likes being told or even hinted at that they are not who or what they are. their entire motive and reason for living goes right down the drain. and if they continue to hold onto it, they go right down the drain with it.
    and it's not that people never change. people change all the time. but they change from one singular identity to another. i was that, now i am this. which brings us to what would he change if he could change anything? what can be changed that hasn't already been changed a thousand times revolution after revolution, avant garde after avant garde? what opportunity for change doesn't already exist? he can think of nothing. no words come to him to answer those or related questions.
    does he want anything to change? change from what to what? everything already is in a constant state of changing. should that be changed? is that what we want - not for things to change but to stop changing. that would be change. but stop changing and do what? remain as things are now? or remain as things have been? or remain as things will be? and all this in terms of what the external world does. fuck what the external world does.
    and internally apart from the external world for him is the island and the machine and the project and the game and the theory of all those together. yet part of that is his seeing those being manifested in the external world. he is on the island in the cafe. the machine surrounds him. the project is being carried out and the game is being played - all according to theory. he can think of nothing other than that that he wants except for what he needs for himself to survive in all of it. but the machine provides that. the machine provides everything through the process of the game which is all part of the project.
    he sits here on the island in the cafe. he has a certain amount of companionship without attachments or responsibility. and to be able to sit and watch it and write about it without being disturbed. why would he want to change that? and someone else who gets it. there are those who get parts of it but none see the whole. they do not see the infinite perfection of it.
    they continually put if conditions on it. if this. if that. but that's part of its infinite perfection is that they can do that and it alters nothing about it except what they want or need altered in order for those if conditions to be worked into it. but what gets worked in about those if conditions is not them being actualized but continuing to be in a state of if. but does anyone expect them or even want or need them to be actualized more than that? they provide balance for the project as a whole.
    but this all breaks down somewhere - or it should. it can't be right. he returns to it again and reworks it from the beginning - if he can find one. but he never can and so is stuck and arbitrarily picks out one point out of the many points that could be as much a beginning as the one he picks that sort of makes sense to him that it should be a beginning. the same is true with what he may decide as being the end. but what is beginning or ending besides what he may perceive from his perspective as a mortal human being in mortal human history? is it all beginning and ending and continuing? that very quickly turns inside out on itself. whether it's true or real or not it's not something he can hold in his mind for very long though it is the only thing in his mind as everything in his mind is only fractional aspect parts of it that are only just how much of it he can perceive at any given time. does something cease to exist when one is not looking at it? do all the other points of beginning cease to exist when he picks one as a beginning point?
    forget that.
    nevermind.
    here he sits. something smells bad, there's nobody sucking his cock, he has no dental coverage and his teeth are falling apart, he's not at the beach, a few old girlfriends and his ex-wife plus some other people hate his guts, he's not high, there's a couple of drunk ya-hoos making noise out in the parking lot, there's any number of women and children starving, being beaten and tortured, raped and murdered while their men fight wars and beat and torture and rape and murder other women and children, there are people who are plain disappointed, cheated and lied to and betrayed, there's still nuclear weapons being made, trees being cut down, earth dug up or paved over, pollution going into the air and water, etc. and he sits here worrying about how and where and when and why it all begins, continues and ends. what a jerk. when is he ever going to get with the program?
    and there is no island or machine or project or game or even a theory. when is he going to forget about that?

    ya-hoo!
    and it is immediately stepped on. nothing as such can be allowed to exist even if it is as beautiful as a butterfly. nothing that might lead to happiness and joy. one must always be led to feel sorrow and misery. it's the law. who are we to question it? we may speculate upon it. we may dwell on how sorrowful and miserable it is that such is the law that happiness and joy are prohibited because of course we are by doing so obeying the law. no problem there. and if we are anyone or a few of us to feel happiness and joy we are only permitted to do so if it is either at another's expense and/or excludes others such that they are not led to feeling it also. for every one in heaven let there be a thousand in hell. and let those in heaven feel such happiness and joy that they don't give a rat's ass about the sorrow and misery of those in hell. let this be the law of the land. let all obey.
    and it was so allowed and done. and such has not changed for all of human memory nor will it ever change for all of human expectation.
    even if it is that thousands feel happiness and joy let there be at least one who feels sorrow and misery. that is as far as the law will bend.
    and let all struggle and fight among each other not to be left being that one. such is how the law is upheld.

    by one generation after another with it going this way and that.
    and part of the game is that it comes out of a hat - or it appears to. but that is how it translates out of how the machine works which is how the underlying structure (the gameboard) is set in motion toward an equilibrium with the positions (pieces) moving in relation to it which means neither the first is the last nor the last is the first or any other expected arrangement of same because who is to say from what location and direction the movements of the machine might come from? and who can ever change it because no one knows it's even happening?
    and the machine is directed from the island.
    the results come in and plans are made as to how and which to respond to.
    he adjusts the transmission.
    he is one more component of the overall project scattered to hell and heaven and back. protocol of alignment. inspiration and random abandonment.

    and the poets are dead. all those who knew and waited for and enjoyed love when it came to their imagination lifting them briefly from their otherwise tortured lives. alone in the tower all the night of many moons. in the meadow, in the garden of roses, during the afternoon at the lake or the sea in morning gray pewter soft light. all the places the spirits dwelt as whispering ghosts now the great deafening noise of the shouting masses drown as they trample through these secret coves now starred on every tourist map. now the poet, if one still seeks the sorrowed and troubled life, must seek new places where silence descends into the vacuum the crowd has left behind. new frontiers behind the lines of those marching onward stumbling through the ruin they make of their curiosity.
    where can one be naked anymore? where can we go look upon one another to see ourselves as we once were as children?
    love has been raped. love files lawsuits. love speaks no more. love turns its face away after a look of glaring anger. love forgives no one.

    love remains hidden deep in the heart behind barbed wire. love will survive at any cost. love does not give any part of itself away. love loans itself out. it will act and perform for one who comes up with the right price. it will nod and smile at the appropriate times and places. it will hold and hug and kiss and speak soothing reassuring phrases. it will follow the script. it will demand payment in direct deposits into its account.
    love lives in luxury though to all outward appearance it seems impoverished. that is the bait and trap. love seeks pity but offers none. love seeks love but offers none. the love it collects as payment from others it keeps for itself. none can love love as love loves itself. it sees its own face in the gaze of another's eyes in rapt adoration. it is the object of desire and what has more power than that? this power has built and destroyed the mightiest empires. this power makes the wise into fools. this power that makes the conqueror lay down one's sword and fall to one's knees.
    and these poets who sing its praises, who are its priests, who covert the world to its religion with itself as the highest goal and ideal. love alone will save us, these poets proclaim. what is life without love? what worth is anything else without love?
    and so love has stolen every heart. and what has love given back in exchange but sorrow and misery when its promises are reveled as empty dreams? when one discovered one has been robbed of all one could have enjoyed. instead one surrendered it to love. and love walks away laughing.
    and those who warn of this are scorned as cold and heartless and bitter cynics. they are mocked and ignored or chased away. but their words come back to one who did not listen and went out and learned from experience that their words were true.
    who wants to hear and believe that love is a deceit and a lie? who wants to hear and believe that love is a vampire thing feeding on the life soul of all it can seduce? who wants to hear and believe that its beautiful face is a mask it wears to cover over a face so hideous none can bear to look at it?
    yet love is all we need.

    and he writes what he does not believe. he writes what he does not want to believe. he writes what is crazy to believe. but what could he write that would not be crazy to believe? what could he write that he would want to believe? what could he write that would be something he could believe? it would be best, he thinks to himself, if i didn't write anything at all. but could he believe that? does he want to? but he has no choice. we tell him what to write and he writes it. we do not care how crazy it might be or how crazy he may appear seeming to believe what he is writing. we don't care if he wants to believe it or can believe it or not. it is to be written and that's it. period. and he cannot resist as we have gotten him to love us above everything else he could possibly experience or imagine. who or what he sees us as cannot be described except it has captured all of whatever love he is capable of feeling and giving to another. we are his sole object of desire. all else pales to gray against our radiant glory of blinding beauty of being. which isn't to state that that is what we are, only what we have managed to convince him that we are. and it was rather easy. that vision already pre-existed in his mind. we merely needed to get him to attach it to us. it was something he was already willing to turn himself over to completely without question if it were to be anything ever real within his experience as real. though all of its energy that feeds into it, and subsequently to us, is generated by him it was something he was unable to create and manifest on his own. we had to provide to focal point for that energy and once that was provided he did all the rest. it was as simple as throwing a lit match onto gasoline. we suppose that we are god to him, though there is no such thing as god - even he knows that. but that does not stop him. he will do anything we command. we created nothing. he creates it all. all we wanted was his complete subjugation of will.
    but for what purpose and for what possible reason? he wonders about that when we allow him to. it's just because we feel like it and because we can. we have nothing better to do. or, there is a reason and purpose. but we are not going to tell you that.

    from a possible hope that is even unformed as well as unborn that we believe might exist at some time which is nothing like our own or any which has been.
    doo-wah-ditty-dada.
    into exploration of whatnot that we are not to enter or venture. we are warned that due to our ignorance we do not even know our way to the gate. what gate? this gate that they have erected for themselves and guard and protect? this gate we are to worship and admire them for their discovery of it? a gate toward where? toward what? it is the gate of the arts and sciences. it is the gate of power and authority. and they are many who claim to possess and hold it. but how many other gates are there by however many other names? are we surrounded by nothing but gates? it certainly seems so by the way these speak. and i got the blues from my baby cuz my baby she done give me the blues. each gate held by whatever group claiming to hold it and is hidden behind ritual and secret knowledge known only to this elect exclusive group - the individual, the family, the clan, the tribe, the nation.
    to hell with the gates and their groups. we will wander aimlessly gladly forever.

    so what else can we rabble and babble on about and trash here. this or that, whatever it seems to be at the moment that we might reasonable be remotely displeased about or think is right or wrong, or just wanna bitch and whine about. such is being human and what being human is all about. nothing satisfies except to endlessly go on about what one is dissatisfied with. nothing is so gratifying as harping about everything one finds annoying - especially if by doing so it annoys others. oh boy. ho-hum. just having a nice day after another here in the cesspool of paradise with all that's been shit and pissed and vomited and flushed down here from the heavenly host that we're swimming in over our heads with the bottom so very far below that we can only reach it when we grow sick and tired and die and sink and decompose adding our own putrid decayed flesh to the general overall disgusting filth that builds up making it deeper and deeper with each generation.
    oh boy. ho-hum.
    and we think it's all brand goddamn fucking new. we think we're smashing the old traditions and the old order to pieces and burying them forever as a foundation for the new traditions and the new order. but in our ignorant youthful haste to live our lives all in one moment we forget - or did we ever learn? - that doing this is precisely what the old traditions and the old order have done to that which preceded them. everything is passed on generation to generation and no generation learns from those before. it's just the same rituals played out over and over with all the tomorrows becoming used up yesterdays that once radiated hope that has become despair.
    it's a sick and twisted tale our history of all our futures become that we never seem to remember and remind ourselves of until our own time has come and gone and become just another sick twist added to the rest.
    does it ever fucking end? who ends it? what ends it? certainly not these waves of the new regime taking over from the old. that's what's old to begin with. we flip a coin and hope for the best. 50/50.
    as the changes changing through endless changelessness. as we remain ever as we were with all the technological wonder we build around us at this addictive exponential rate. monkeys in wonderland. how much is improved and how much is merely changed? we flip the coin again. will it ever change ourselves?
    and what if we ever arrive at our dream come true? will we be able to stop then? how will we know? who is to say? who has a voice and who does not? when more than just our self-appointed leaders decide. when all humanity has a voice. what will we speak? we all have a voice now but it is all babble. no wonder the leaders cannot listen. listen to who? listen to the legions of legions as though we were all mad or possessed? can we stay where we are and improve it to our liking? can we insure all have what they need in this brave new world?
    progressive. hitch the mules back to the wagons. there's still one more mountain to cross.
    and he has a couch by the window and that's where he's going to take a nap. this all looks fine to him. he ain't going nowhere.

    and he dreams on and on. meanwhile we operate the machine. we pull the strings that pull the strings that rearrange the lines of the web framework of the structure that follows and takes another shape. like sailing across the sea. yet infinitely more complex. from ethereal to manifest and from the manifest to the material we calculate the flow and figure the course we want to take in relationship to it all and make the necessary adjustments which alter the flow that then needs to be recalculated to figure out a course to that new relationship that keeps us on the old heading which at times requires dramatically veering tacks and turns and at times complete reversals of direction. sailing across the sea. the sea is humanity. the machine knows the way. we know the machine.
    the machine exists within all. it is a thing unto itself that is the fundamental basis to all else. the machine builds/grows onto itself. the machine and its self-manufactured components that are the machine itself in manifest form and reality as opposed to its potential form and reality which is formless and unreal operate in relation to what is not the machine - the ethereal. if the machine is a sailing ship then the ethereal is the wind and the tides and currents. we are the crew. it is indescribable. the machine lies beyond description. it is not a machine, yet it is a machine. it is the machine of all of us together.
    or something like that.
    we transcend the literal sense through metaphorical enterprise as the ship unmoving as a stone pyramid on a sea of sand radiant hyperdimensional subterfuge in entirely different manifestations projects itself realized space/time swallowed a gnat like pulling a rabbit out of a hat as the cops bust some lonely guy who just got to town writing squiggly codes on their ticket forms and we're sitting here whistling the blues and minding our ps and qs.
    and belief and not belief. and the broken hearts of the broken hearted. the blaseness. the gray hum-drum. the belief in meaninglessness rigidly believed as any orthodox dogma. it is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
    we have obliterated ourselves. our camps are in disarray. where is this? where is that? where is the other thing? we still meet on the old old old battleground just like the good old days of yore. everyone is represented against one another.
    and what do any of these have to do with us? who are they to us or we to them? and with that another battleline is drawn. we who refuse and those who are all too willing. and we did not draw the line. we do not even have any weapons. but our existence is an abomination to them. they will not let anyone back out. one must kill or die. they demand that we must believe in something. they decide what we believe in for us. of course they decide that we believe in all that they oppose. they need an enemy. they believe that we are that enemy. they attack. we are defeated. it is all according to our plan.
    everyone is annihilated. the only difference between us and them is that we do not care. everything continues. how can anything that is not believed be destroyed? we have never believed. we have always doubted. we doubt ourselves most of all. they have created us to be the enemy that must be destroyed. that is our immortality. when will it ever be that we are not needed and created again and again in order to destroy us again and again? but we do not believe in our immortality. they believe in it for us. we just sit back and eat our cake and have it too. we are mere phantoms passing through their world. we have never belonged. we exist as this or we exist as that. or we exist as the other thing. we are awakened to ourselves in the garden. this is our dream that we are born and live and die. we go back into it again and again. this is the game. they make the rules. we just play along. we glide along their waves of conflict sailing away. their conflict is our means of propulsion. we tack against this. we turn around that. it doesn't matter. we have no goal or direction in mind. we just enjoy the sailing.
    and they gather on the field of flags around their own flag and banner. and his flag? he has yet to disentangle himself from it while theirs are planted in the ground and unfurled and flap in the same breeze under the same sky. and this gathering of all. and the shouting of the voices. and the raising of the fists. and marching marching marching. and the pomp and ceremony. and the speeches. and the ranting tirades.
    but here in the cafe. and here on the island. and his flag is the machine. and the machine is made of flags. and the flags are the sails of the ship ever sailing away. and the schematic of the machine is the course the ship takes in a network of vibrational harmonies and disharmonies as if 6 were 9 and equaled 42. and the same applies or helping others using it in his brain something sparking interfering all just the mind creating maybe all the machine is.
    where do we enter and exit the metaphor? where do we enter and exit the reality? where do enter and exit ourselves and our relationship with one another? where is where? when is when? what is what? how is how? why is why? who is who? and what of all the possibilities?
    on these pages of words and words and words we forget what they are. we forget what we are writing as we write it. we forget what they mean. they're the scribblings of monkeys who are frightened of their own shadows. monkeys who have built defenses against a hostile world only to have their own defenses turn against them. monkeys who built a fortress prison around themselves so nothing could get in but they could not get out. and these pages of words are their minds pacing in circles that signify freedom. the mind, the holiness of the mind to wander where it pleases while the body is chained to the oars of the machine. stroke! stroke! stroke! faster! faster! faster! ramming speed! all for one. one for all. strength through unity. how often have we heard and had our hearts thrill at the battle cry? all troubling questions cast aside. forward!
    the machine purrs and snuggles up to him. he scratches it behind its ears. good beast, he says. the only friend i have left in the world. without you i am nothing. and he gives the machine a biscuit. and the machine is content for awhile, curls up and takes a nap. but at a single drop of a pin that isn't quite right and it springs up again wide awake claws out and ready. he feels perfectly safe. and he curls up next to it and takes a nap too.
    and in another world he imagines himself in the cafe. he is actually somewhere quite safe and warm taking a nap. and it's a very deep dream. it seems very real. its pleasure and pain are most keenly felt but always there's a distance. they come close but cannot touch him unless he imagines them touching him which he does at times. but it's not the same as them actually touching him.
    and in this dream and in the cafe he writes about himself having this dream and being in the cafe.
    and these who sit near him and discuss the wise ones of the past who said, follow yourselves, don't follow me.
    and around and around it goes.
    is it perfect yet? is it finished? complete? is it as it should be? how are we to know where or when?
    the magick spell is cast. around around they go again. monkeys in a trace spinning and dancing in circles feeling and believing they are going somewhere. this, the fundamental force that has built civilizations and in turn brought them all down to their ruin. the process follows the same course and path around and around up and down in and out. do we know where we are? all we've made of it so far is to make these cycles more complex and convoluted. few have escaped. to escape is never to be heard from again. who is seen no more?
    here he is and here he is now. he hasn't gone anywhere else at any time. this remains forever. others come and they go.
    he turns a dial on the machine. he unplugs one thing and plugs in two other things. he pushes a button. he pulls a lever.
    there are reasons for this but he usually doesn't take the time to think of them. it takes so much time to think. there is so little time to think. no one else is expected to think. why should he be expected to think? but he tries to. but he usually fails. but he continues to do what  he does.
    he sits and smokes cigarettes. he drinks coffee. he sits and gazes out the window. he sits and writes in notebooks. this is what he writes. he writes about himself writing. he writes about other things too. we sit with him though either he or us may not really be here. we might be making him up. he might be making us up. either he or us or both are mad.
    but he does exist. others see him and some sit at his table and talk to him. he nods his head and listens. unless it is they who are not really here. there are so many possibilities. we are not ourselves altogether concerned about who or what is real. it seems though to concern him especially when it comes up that who might not be real is him.
    we know we are real. we don't even have to think about it like others seem to have to. but, if we're not real then we're not real. so what? and nothing but ourselves needs to be real. and we need not be anyone other than me, myself and i. we certainly don't need him. we don't mind him as long as he stays out of trouble which for the most part he does.
    and we sit back and smile amused smiles to ourselves. we got him just where we want him. our grand design and plan is working hunky dory fine and is right on schedule. he's exactly the one we needed and were looking for. it couldn't be more perfect.